Today’s message from Lao Tzu is about how hard we try to live really good lives, create good societies, and teach our kids good values.
We have a sense of the principles we need to rely, insist and agree on in order to foster cooperation not only in our close relationships, but at scale.
Some of these principles may include:
Duty, truth, worthiness, education, justice, order, knowledge, power, honour and faith.
These are the things that create the very fabric of society. When we create and instill these principles in our children they are carried on for generations!
Lao Tzu did have a specific and clear reminder for us on these very principles. He tried to remind us not to lose sight of the reason why we would want to have good relationships in the first place.
Why would we want to teach our children good values and why would we want to create great societies? It’s because we would love to live in a world where we can just let our guard down and love the humans around us, while we trust that they would do for us the same. We forget this though. We forget why we came up with these “rules”. We get fixated on the tools – on these principles – while forgetting what these principles are supposed to stand for… for love…
And now we enforce these ideals on our children and our neighbours and ourselves without an ounce of love and what was supposed to be empowering becomes a weapon that dis-empowers.
Thank you for this reminder Lao Tzu:
“Duty without LOVE creates annoyance.
Truth without LOVE creates criticism.
Worthiness without LOVE creates arrogance.
Education without LOVE creates contradiction.
Justice without LOVE creates hardness.
Order without LOVE creates pettiness.
Knowledge without LOVE creates dogmatism.
Power without LOVE creates violence.
Honour without LOVE creates pride.
Faith without LOVE creates fanaticism.”
All of the right values for us to hold near to our hearts, but let’s remember to hold these principles in a space of love.
Guiding Mantras:
- Love is the foundation of all true values.
- Use your values to express your love, not enforce your will.
- Let love guide your actions, and your principles will become tools for building a better world.
Have a beautiful Friday peeps!
– pierre –
Today’s LIVE meditation is: Sharing love.